What is M1a1?
1.
Tank, Full-Tracked, 120mm M1A1.
The M1A1 Abrams is by far the workhorse of the United States Army's Armored Force. All tanks used in the initial invasion Of Iraq in OIF were A1's. Not the High tech M1A2SEPs of the 4th ID or the M1A2s of the 3rd ACR.
Prooving that CITVs and FBCB2s are not needed to annailate enemy armies.
The M1A1 is equpied with the M256I 120mm smoothbore cannon which has a effective range of 3870 meters because this is the highest range the ballistic computer can compute when creating the firing solution.
The Commander's weapon is the M2 Caliber .50 Heavy Machince Gun or "Ma Duece" with the M-10 charging feature. This gives the Tank Commader an advantage over A2 TCs, there is a sight for the machine gun inside the tank allowin percice aim and steady fire out to tracer burn out at 1200 meters. On the A2 the FLEX M2 must be used so the TC is basicly shooting from the hip.
The gunner, or GOLF, has a M240 machine gun mounted coaxialy of the main gun. Meaning where ever the target retical is aiming the COAX and the main gun are both aiming there. Tracer burn out is at 900 meters however kills have been confirmed at 1200 meters.
The Loader is equiped with a M240 Machine Gun as well. It gives him somthing to hold on to. This weapon is used as a scare the enemy with noise weapon. Becasue shooting the gun is never practiced and the weapon mounted there in in acurate.
Tanks are the true problem solvers
It took 4 hours to get the 88 to our location so we can pull the pack from the damaged M1A1
2.
This is comparable to the
35 M1 tanks were destroyed by Iraqi fire during Operation Desert Storm.
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